Lim Bo Seng
Encyclopedia
Lim Bo Seng was a World War II
anti-Japanese
resistance fighter
based in Singapore
and Malaya
.
colonial government. He went on to read business at the University of Hong Kong.
In 1930, Lim married Gan Choo Neo, a Nyonya
woman from the Lim Clan association hall of Singapore. They had eight children, one of whom died in infancy. Initially a Taoist
, Lim converted to Christianity
.
broke out in 1937, Lim and many other overseas Chinese in Singapore participated in anti-Japanese activities, such as boycotting of Japanese goods and fund-raising to support their fellow countrymen in resisting the Japanese invaders in China.
Towards the end of 1937, hundreds of overseas Chinese working in Japanese-owned industries in Malaya went on strike. At that time, the Japanese government owned a tin mine in Dungun (龍運), Terengganu
, Malaya, where nearly 3,000 Chinese labourers were employed. The tin was shipped to Japan and used as raw material to manufacture weapons. Lim felt that if the Chinese workers in the Dungun mine went on strike, the Japanese would suffer a huge loss, so he planned to make the workers go on strike. Around February 1938, Lim travelled to Dungun with Chuang Hui-chuan (莊惠泉) of the Singapore Anxi Association to carry out their plan. Chuang went to the mine to persuade the workers to go on strike while Lim contacted the local police and gained their support. By early March, Lim and Chuang achieved success as the workers left the mine and followed them to Singapore. On March 11, 1938, Lim and the Singapore Chinese community held a welcoming ceremony for the workers, who were later resettled and found employment in Singapore.
In December 1941, Lim was put in charge of organizing a group of volunteers to resist the Japanese, who were advancing towards Southeast Asia. The volunteers put up a fierce fight against the Japanese invaders during the Battle of Singapore
in February 1942.
with other Chinese community leaders and made his way to India
later. He recruited and trained hundreds of secret agents through intensive military intelligence missions from China and India. He set up the Sino-British guerrilla task force Force 136
in mid-1942 together with Captain John Davis
of the Special Operations Executive
(SOE).
Operation Gustavus was aimed at establishing an espionage
network in Malaya and Singapore to gather intelligence about Japanese activities, thereby aiding the British in planning their re-capture of the colonies, codenamed Operation Zipper
.
On 24 May 1943, the first group of Force 136 agents, codenamed Gustavus I and led by Captain Davies, arrived in Perak
onboard the Dutch submarine O-24. The O-24 would rendezvousz with Gustavus I again in September and November 1943, transferring supplies and personnel from Gustavus IV and V respectively. Its sister ship
, the O-23, transported Gustavus II and III, under Captain Richard Broome, arriving on 25 June and 4 August 1943 respectively. Lim arrived in Malaya on 2 November 1943 as part of Gustavus V. He travelled under the alias Tan Choon Lim to avoid identification by the Japanese, claiming to be a businessman when he passed through checkpoints
.
On Perak, Davies and Lim re-established contact with a Major Freddie Chapman
, who was part of a British unit which stayed behind after the Malayan Campaign, carrying out small-scale attacks against the Japanese during the occupation
. They also met guerilla fighters of the Malayan People's Anti-Japanese Army (MPAJA), two of whom were Chin Peng
and Lai Teck, where they reached an agreement that the resistance group would fall under British command, in exchange for weapons, supplies and training. One of the Chinese provision shops in Ipoh
, Jian Yik Jan, was used as an Allied espionage base. Communications between the agents were done by smuggling messages in empty toothpaste tubes, salted fish and diaries.
Operation Gustavus failed before the agents managed to achieve any results. A communist guerrilla was captured by the Japanese in January 1944, who revealed the existence of the Allied spy network operating on Pangkor Island
. The Japanese launched a full-scale counter espionage operation on the island and by late March 1944, more than 200 soldiers were on the island. On March 24, the Japanese Kempeitai
arrested a fisherman, Chua Koon Eng, at Teluk Murrek on the Perak coast. Chua was working on Pangkor Island when Li Han-kwang of Force 136 approached him and requested to use his boat for their communications. Chua told the Kempeitai what he knew when he was interrogated. Li was later captured by the Japanese and he confirmed Chua's accounts of Force 136 under torture and then began to feign cooperation with the Japanese in order to escape captivity. The entire spy network was destroyed by 31 March 1944, and was not re-established until February 1945.
Lim was captured by the Japanese under Marshal Ōnishi Satoru (大西覚) at a roadblock in Gopeng
the next day. Lim was taken to the Kempeitai headquarters for interrogation and he refused to provide the Japanese with any information about Force 136 despite being subjected to severe torture. Instead, he protested against the ill-treatment of his comrades in prison. He fell ill with dysentery
and was bedridden by the end of May 1944. Lim died in the early hours on June 29, 1944. He was later buried behind the Batu Gajah
prison compound in an unmarked spot. After the Japanese surrender, Lim's wife, Gan Choo Neo, was informed of her husband's death by the priest of St. Andrew's School. Gan travelled with her eldest son to bring her husband's remains home later.
Lim's remains arrived at the Tanjong Pagar railway station
in Singapore on Dec 7, 1945. Upon arrival, the hearse was sent off by a large procession of British officers and prominent businessmen, from the Station to Hock Ann Biscuit Factory in Upper Serangoon Road, via Armenian Street. On the same day, a memorial service for Lim was held at the Tong Teh Library of the Kuomingtang Association in Singapore.
A funeral service was held on 13 January 1946 at City Hall
to mourn Lim's death. Lim's remains was transported in a coffin to a hill in MacRitchie Reservoir
(coordinates: 1°20'31.76"N 103°49'50.60"E) for burial with full military honours. Lim was posthumously awarded the rank of Major-General by the Chinese Nationalist Government.
. Actor Rayson Tan
played the role of Lim Bo Seng.
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
anti-Japanese
Empire of Japan
The Empire of Japan is the name of the state of Japan that existed from the Meiji Restoration on 3 January 1868 to the enactment of the post-World War II Constitution of...
resistance fighter
Resistance during World War II
Resistance movements during World War II occurred in every occupied country by a variety of means, ranging from non-cooperation, disinformation and propaganda to hiding crashed pilots and even to outright warfare and the recapturing of towns...
based in Singapore
Singapore
Singapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the...
and Malaya
British Malaya
British Malaya loosely described a set of states on the Malay Peninsula and the Island of Singapore that were brought under British control between the 18th and the 20th centuries...
.
Family background and early life
Lim was born in 1909 to Lim Loh (林路; alias Lim Chee Gee), a well-known building constructor, as the 11th child but the first male child in the family. In 1917, Lim came to Singapore at the age of 16 to study in Raffles Institution under the BritishUnited Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
colonial government. He went on to read business at the University of Hong Kong.
In 1930, Lim married Gan Choo Neo, a Nyonya
Peranakan
Peranakan Chinese and Baba-Nyonya are terms used for the descendants of late 15th and 16th-century Chinese immigrants to the Indonesian archipelago of Nusantara during the Colonial era....
woman from the Lim Clan association hall of Singapore. They had eight children, one of whom died in infancy. Initially a Taoist
Taoism
Taoism refers to a philosophical or religious tradition in which the basic concept is to establish harmony with the Tao , which is the mechanism of everything that exists...
, Lim converted to Christianity
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
.
As a businessman
Lim inherited his father's business when the latter died in 1929. Lim started with running two businesses in brick manufacturing and biscuit production, before collaborating with his brothers to venture into building construction. Apart from being successful in his business career, Lim was also a notable young leader of the Singapore Chinese community, having been nominated to take on several posts in the community, including: Chairman of the Singapore Building Industry Association (新加坡建築業公會); Board Member of the Singapore Chinese Chamber of Commerce (新加坡中華總商會); Executive Member and Education Director of the Singapore Hokkien Huay Kuan (新加坡福建會館).Anti-Japanese activism
When the Second Sino-Japanese WarSecond Sino-Japanese War
The Second Sino-Japanese War was a military conflict fought primarily between the Republic of China and the Empire of Japan. From 1937 to 1941, China fought Japan with some economic help from Germany , the Soviet Union and the United States...
broke out in 1937, Lim and many other overseas Chinese in Singapore participated in anti-Japanese activities, such as boycotting of Japanese goods and fund-raising to support their fellow countrymen in resisting the Japanese invaders in China.
Towards the end of 1937, hundreds of overseas Chinese working in Japanese-owned industries in Malaya went on strike. At that time, the Japanese government owned a tin mine in Dungun (龍運), Terengganu
Terengganu
Terengganu is a sultanate and constitutive state of federal Malaysia. The state is also known by its Arabic honorific, Darul Iman...
, Malaya, where nearly 3,000 Chinese labourers were employed. The tin was shipped to Japan and used as raw material to manufacture weapons. Lim felt that if the Chinese workers in the Dungun mine went on strike, the Japanese would suffer a huge loss, so he planned to make the workers go on strike. Around February 1938, Lim travelled to Dungun with Chuang Hui-chuan (莊惠泉) of the Singapore Anxi Association to carry out their plan. Chuang went to the mine to persuade the workers to go on strike while Lim contacted the local police and gained their support. By early March, Lim and Chuang achieved success as the workers left the mine and followed them to Singapore. On March 11, 1938, Lim and the Singapore Chinese community held a welcoming ceremony for the workers, who were later resettled and found employment in Singapore.
In December 1941, Lim was put in charge of organizing a group of volunteers to resist the Japanese, who were advancing towards Southeast Asia. The volunteers put up a fierce fight against the Japanese invaders during the Battle of Singapore
Battle of Singapore
The Battle of Singapore was fought in the South-East Asian theatre of the Second World War when the Empire of Japan invaded the Allied stronghold of Singapore. Singapore was the major British military base in Southeast Asia and nicknamed the "Gibraltar of the East"...
in February 1942.
Life in Force 136
On 11 February 1942, Lim left Singapore and travelled to SumatraSumatra
Sumatra is an island in western Indonesia, westernmost of the Sunda Islands. It is the largest island entirely in Indonesia , and the sixth largest island in the world at 473,481 km2 with a population of 50,365,538...
with other Chinese community leaders and made his way to India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
later. He recruited and trained hundreds of secret agents through intensive military intelligence missions from China and India. He set up the Sino-British guerrilla task force Force 136
Force 136
Force 136 was the general cover name for a branch of the British World War II organization, the Special Operations Executive . The organisation was established to encourage and supply resistance movements in enemy-occupied territory, and occasionally mount clandestine sabotage operations...
in mid-1942 together with Captain John Davis
John Davis
- American politicians:*John Davis , Massachusetts state representative and federal judge*John Davis , U.S. Representative from Kansas...
of the Special Operations Executive
Special Operations Executive
The Special Operations Executive was a World War II organisation of the United Kingdom. It was officially formed by Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Minister of Economic Warfare Hugh Dalton on 22 July 1940, to conduct guerrilla warfare against the Axis powers and to instruct and aid local...
(SOE).
Operation Gustavus
Espionage
Espionage or spying involves an individual obtaining information that is considered secret or confidential without the permission of the holder of the information. Espionage is inherently clandestine, lest the legitimate holder of the information change plans or take other countermeasures once it...
network in Malaya and Singapore to gather intelligence about Japanese activities, thereby aiding the British in planning their re-capture of the colonies, codenamed Operation Zipper
Operation Zipper
During the Second World War, Operation Zipper was a British plan to capture either Port Swettenham or Port Dickson, Malaya as staging areas for the recapture of Singapore. However, due to the end of the war in the Pacific, it was never fully executed. Some of the proposed landings on Penang went...
.
On 24 May 1943, the first group of Force 136 agents, codenamed Gustavus I and led by Captain Davies, arrived in Perak
Perak
Perak , one of the 13 states of Malaysia, is the second largest state in the Peninsular Malaysia bordering Kedah and Yala Province of Thailand to the north, Penang to the northwest, Kelantan and Pahang to the east, Selangor the Strait of Malacca to the south and west.Perak means silver in Malay...
onboard the Dutch submarine O-24. The O-24 would rendezvousz with Gustavus I again in September and November 1943, transferring supplies and personnel from Gustavus IV and V respectively. Its sister ship
Sister ship
A sister ship is a ship of the same class as, or of virtually identical design to, another ship. Such vessels share a near-identical hull and superstructure layout, similar displacement, and roughly comparable features and equipment...
, the O-23, transported Gustavus II and III, under Captain Richard Broome, arriving on 25 June and 4 August 1943 respectively. Lim arrived in Malaya on 2 November 1943 as part of Gustavus V. He travelled under the alias Tan Choon Lim to avoid identification by the Japanese, claiming to be a businessman when he passed through checkpoints
Border checkpoint
A border checkpoint is a place, generally between two countries, where travellers and/or goods are inspected. Authorization often is required to enter a country through its borders. Access-controlled borders often have a limited number of checkpoints where they can be crossed without legal...
.
On Perak, Davies and Lim re-established contact with a Major Freddie Chapman
Freddie Spencer Chapman
Lieutenant Colonel Frederick Spencer Chapman, DSO & Bar, ED was a British Army officer and World War II veteran, most famous for his exploits behind enemy lines in Japanese occupied Malaya...
, who was part of a British unit which stayed behind after the Malayan Campaign, carrying out small-scale attacks against the Japanese during the occupation
Japanese occupation of Malaya, North Borneo and Sarawak
Throughout much of World War II, British Malaya, North Borneo and Sarawak were under Japanese occupation.The Japanese Empire commenced the Pacific War with the invasion of Kota Bahru in Kelantan on 8 December 1941 at 00:25, about 90 minutes before the Attack on Pearl Harbor in Hawaii at 07:48 on 7...
. They also met guerilla fighters of the Malayan People's Anti-Japanese Army (MPAJA), two of whom were Chin Peng
Chin Peng
Chin Peng, former OBE , was born Ong Boon Hua in Sitiawan, and was a long-time leader of the Malayan Communist Party...
and Lai Teck, where they reached an agreement that the resistance group would fall under British command, in exchange for weapons, supplies and training. One of the Chinese provision shops in Ipoh
Ipoh
Ipoh is the capital city of Perak state, Malaysia. It is approximately 200 km north of Kuala Lumpur on the North-South Expressway....
, Jian Yik Jan, was used as an Allied espionage base. Communications between the agents were done by smuggling messages in empty toothpaste tubes, salted fish and diaries.
Operation Gustavus failed before the agents managed to achieve any results. A communist guerrilla was captured by the Japanese in January 1944, who revealed the existence of the Allied spy network operating on Pangkor Island
Pangkor Island
Pulau Pangkor is an island off the coast of Perak in north-west peninsular Malaysia, reached by ferry from Lumut . It has a land area of only 8 square kilometers, and a population of approximately 25,000 islanders...
. The Japanese launched a full-scale counter espionage operation on the island and by late March 1944, more than 200 soldiers were on the island. On March 24, the Japanese Kempeitai
Kempeitai
The was the military police arm of the Imperial Japanese Army from 1881 to 1945. It was not an English-style military police, but a French-style gendarmerie...
arrested a fisherman, Chua Koon Eng, at Teluk Murrek on the Perak coast. Chua was working on Pangkor Island when Li Han-kwang of Force 136 approached him and requested to use his boat for their communications. Chua told the Kempeitai what he knew when he was interrogated. Li was later captured by the Japanese and he confirmed Chua's accounts of Force 136 under torture and then began to feign cooperation with the Japanese in order to escape captivity. The entire spy network was destroyed by 31 March 1944, and was not re-established until February 1945.
Capture and death
Gopeng
Gopeng is a town located in Mukim Teja, District of Kampar, Perak, Malaysia. It is situated approximately 20 km south of Ipoh, the state capital. The town is located on the west side of the North-South Expressway stretch of Tapah-Simpang Pulai...
the next day. Lim was taken to the Kempeitai headquarters for interrogation and he refused to provide the Japanese with any information about Force 136 despite being subjected to severe torture. Instead, he protested against the ill-treatment of his comrades in prison. He fell ill with dysentery
Dysentery
Dysentery is an inflammatory disorder of the intestine, especially of the colon, that results in severe diarrhea containing mucus and/or blood in the faeces with fever and abdominal pain. If left untreated, dysentery can be fatal.There are differences between dysentery and normal bloody diarrhoea...
and was bedridden by the end of May 1944. Lim died in the early hours on June 29, 1944. He was later buried behind the Batu Gajah
Batu Gajah
Batu Gajah is a town located in the state of Perak in Malaysia, about 24 km from Ipoh, the Perak state capital.-Origins and History:...
prison compound in an unmarked spot. After the Japanese surrender, Lim's wife, Gan Choo Neo, was informed of her husband's death by the priest of St. Andrew's School. Gan travelled with her eldest son to bring her husband's remains home later.
Lim's remains arrived at the Tanjong Pagar railway station
Tanjong Pagar railway station
Tanjong Pagar railway station , also called Keppel Road railway station or Singapore railway station, was until 30 June 2011 the southern terminus of the network operated by Keretapi Tanah Melayu , the main railway operator in Malaysia. The land on which the station and the KTM railway tracks are...
in Singapore on Dec 7, 1945. Upon arrival, the hearse was sent off by a large procession of British officers and prominent businessmen, from the Station to Hock Ann Biscuit Factory in Upper Serangoon Road, via Armenian Street. On the same day, a memorial service for Lim was held at the Tong Teh Library of the Kuomingtang Association in Singapore.
A funeral service was held on 13 January 1946 at City Hall
City Hall, Singapore
The City Hall in Singapore is a national monument gazetted on 14 February 1992. Located in front of the historical Padang and next door to the Supreme Court of Singapore, it was designed and built by the architects of the municipal government, A. Gordans and F. D. Meadows from 1926 to 1929...
to mourn Lim's death. Lim's remains was transported in a coffin to a hill in MacRitchie Reservoir
MacRitchie Reservoir
MacRitchie Reservoir is Singapore's oldest reservoir. The reservoir was completed in 1868 by impounding water from an earth embankment, and was then known as the Impounding Reservoir or Thomson Reservoir....
(coordinates: 1°20'31.76"N 103°49'50.60"E) for burial with full military honours. Lim was posthumously awarded the rank of Major-General by the Chinese Nationalist Government.
Media appearances
Lim was featured as a semi-fictional protagonist in the 1997 Singaporean television drama The Price of PeaceThe Price of Peace
The Price of Peace is a Singaporean World War II period drama television series first run on TCS Eighth Frequency on 30 June 1997. Although the series was originally in Mandarin, an English dubbed version was also broadcast on TCS Fifth Frequency in 1999. The drama was rerun in 2007 on MediaCorp...
. Actor Rayson Tan
Rayson Tan
Rayson Tan is a Singaporean MediaCorp actor.Before joining MediaCorp, Tan worked as a flight attendant with Singapore Airlines. In 1990, he emerged as the 2nd Runner-Up in Singapore's Star Search talent competition...
played the role of Lim Bo Seng.